Reform chairman Lee Anderson has written to Electoral Commission (EC) CEO Vijay Rangarajan over the watchdog’s review of campaign spending limits, accusing Rangarajan of prejudging the outcome and threatening to take legal action. A judicial review on the cards…
The letter follows Rangarajan’s Sunday Times interview last week, in which he said:
“Trust in elections depends on people believing that the rules are fair and transparent, and how much parties and campaigners can spend is a significant part of that picture. Funding is essential to democratic participation and political debate, but the framework must give voters confidence that our elections are being contested on a level playing field.”
It ran a week after Reform banked the £72 million from Harborne and Delo, and Anderson notes the same comments were then copied verbatim into an official Commission statement two days later. Anderson says:
The suggestion that the current framework of funding is contrary to voters confidence in the integrity of elections (conveyed by the use of “but” as a conjunction) poses serious questions as to the impartiality of The Electoral Commission’s review.
The EC’s review was prompted by an August letter from Louise Haigh and Angela Rayner telling the Commission that spending limits “are too high, and ought to be reduced“. It’s war…
Read Anderson’s full letter below:
Dear Vijay,
I am writing in response to the Electoral Commission’s decision to implement a review on spending limits following a letter from convicted fraudster Louise Haigh MP (First Secretary of State and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster) and potential tax dodger Angela Rayner MP (Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government).
The letter was sent to The Electoral Commission on the 29th August 2026 on behalf of the Labour Government. It makes presumptive comments about election financing, which could be argued to be intended to push The Electoral Commission’s review towards a predetermined conclusion. The letter states that “spending limits on parties and candidates are too high, and ought to be reduced” and “it is necessary to limit the spend on campaigning to promote fairness and encourage parties to shift focus firmly on the needs of the voters.”
The Government has also requested that The Electoral Commission “provide recommendations to government by July 2027 at the latest, and sooner if possible” on the grounds of “the urgency of the need to change the way we do politics”. This again presupposes that the Commission will indeed deem it necessary to recommend changes to “the way we do politics.” The request that these recommendations be provided sooner than July 2027, despite the Government also asking “you expand your current review and include the spending limits of candidates” further undermines the credibility of this review as truly independent given the weight of Government pressure towards presupposed outcomes on the tightest possible timescale.
I further note that on the 19th September 2026 you gave a statement to the Sunday Times in your capacity as chief executive of The Electoral Commission. Statements made exclusively to the Sunday Times, who ran the story under the headline “Reform Election fund threatened by spending rules review” were then copied verbatim into the statement released by the Electoral Commission on the 21st September. The Sunday Times stated that “Rangarajan singled out the cap on how much political parties can spend in campaigns and the time it covers — 12 months before a general election at present — as areas to be scrutinised”.
You go on to contend that “Trust in elections depends on people believing that the rules are fair and transparent, and how much parties and campaigners can spend is a significant part of that picture. Funding is essential to democratic participation and political debate, but the framework must give voters confidence that our elections are being contested on a level playing field.” The suggestion that the current framework of funding is contrary to voters confidence in the integrity of elections (conveyed by the use of “but” as a conjunction) poses serious questions as to the impartiality of The Electoral Commission’s review. It comes as no surprise that this briefing to the Sunday Times came just one week after it was revealed that Reform UK received a combined £72 million from 2 donations.
The Government Legal Department’s guidance on public law states that bias occurs where there is a “real possibility of bias to the fair-minded and impartial observer”. The Electoral Commission’s website notes that this informed observer test (set out in the 2001 Porter v Magill judgment) has been adopted by courts “to determine whether there is a possibility of bias arising from ‘predetermination’ or having a ‘closed mind’”. The Electoral Commission specifically cites factors that could lead to successful claims against the Commission on these grounds, including: “Promotion of the same cause as those affected by the decision, for example a long-standing association with one side of a debate, issue, or cause” and “Critical or supportive comments taking a position on an issue which may indicate predetermined conclusions.”
Your comments strongly align with the specific requests made by the Government’s highly leading letter of 29th August and can be argued to take a pre-judgmental tone as to the conclusions of The Electoral Commission’s review. As these comments call the operationally independent nature of The Electoral Commission into question, Reform UK is putting the Electoral Commission on notice that its current approach to the review appears to be unlawful. We would challenge any recommendation made by The Electoral Commission, and subsequent decision, in favour of decreased spending limits on the grounds that its conclusions were coloured by bias arising from predetermination.
I would also draw your attention to the 1995 Fifth Report of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, the same report which recommended the creation of an independent election commission. The report proposed the introduction of spending limits of £20 million on national campaign expenditure in a general election (including benefits in kind) by a political party. Critically, however, the report recommended that the limit should be “index-linked” to account for inflation. The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 ignored this recommendation and used a per constituency spending formula, equivalent to c.£19.5 million for a party standing in every seat. If the original proposals of the 1995 report had been followed and a £20 million cap linked to CPI inflation was created, the cap on national political spending in the 12 months prior to a General Election would have reached £37.6 million in 2024, a higher figure than the current cap of £34 million.
It is deeply regrettable that the subversion of democracy by the Labour Government has forced me to write this letter. All political parties, and the electorate, should be able to trust that The Electoral Commission is a genuinely independent body, acting impartially in the interests of preserving electoral health. The events of the past two weeks have called this principle into question. Should it be necessary, Reform UK will be ready to take commensurate legal action to protect the integrity of all future elections before it is too late.
Yours sincerely,
Lee Anderson
Chairman, Reform UK
Asked by Lobby hacks about his past comments on Trump (“any UK politician who gave Trump the time of day should be ashamed right now”) Burnham was blithe:
“Politicians say things throughout their career, but now the important thing is to focus on the moment you are in.”
Were it so easy…